And while we’re yet to be convinced there’s a well of untapped talent, there is certainly a handful of rising artists to keep a trained ear on. Duo Beyond Average are leading that charge.

Led by MC’s Big O and Jeopardy, their tongue-firmly-in-cheek break through Scouse Ebonics brought national heat with airplay on 1Xtra but it’s their grime-induced F**k The Feds and heavy-hitter Hold Up which display serious weight.

Support slots including Dead Prez and Ghostface followed by the release of their self-titled debut album rounded off a fine 2014 and with the newly-released Kof-directed video of Great Minds Think Alike 2015 is shaping up just nicely. Get on ‘em.

Introduce yourself, and tell us a little about your background.

We are Liverpool’s very own rap duo Beyond Average.

Individually, we go by the names Jeopardy and Big O, we are two of the cities finest lyricists who have teamed up to push the Liverpool hip hop scene and take the genre in our city to the next level.

How did you get together and where have you guys played?

We were mates in high school who both shared a passion for hip hop music and also for the rising genre at the time known as grime.

At the time we where both getting into the idea of writing our own lyrics and used to spend lesson times writing bars then break times and after school spitting what we had to each other.

That then quickly turned into our main hobby and before we knew it we where both getting pretty good and realised we had a rare talent.

We started taking it more and more serious and recorded our first track back in 2006.

We called ourselves Beyond Average and have never looked back. Since then we have released three EPs and an album, performed hundreds of live shows supporting some big UK acts and also US hip hop legends such as Ghostface Killah and Dead Prez plus most recently Redman and Method Man in the Liverpool O2 Academy.

What are your influences and which artists do you listen to at the moment?

Our biggest influence has always been life itself.

Things we have seen and experienced whilst growing up has given us our own musical identity, which is why we try and stay as real to ourselves as we can in our music. But saying that, we don’t like to keep everything too serious, we still like having fun when we are in the studio.

The main artists we listen to are old school hip hop greats, beside from the obvious Biggie and Tupac, we like The Diplomats, Wu-Tang, Nas, The Lox, Big L and Dr. Dre.

We also like a lot of the UK artists that are out right now such as Ghetts, Stormzy, Skepta, Giggs, Krept and Konan and few other up and comers.

Which Liverpool bands and what aspects of the city do you like?

We think our city is the greatest city in the world, it is so unique compared to others we have visited and there is a lot of local talent at the moment.

I think over the last few years, on a whole, the music scene has progressed a lot in many different music styles.

Band wise, we are a big fan of KOF and his band. They are defiantly worth a mention.

Away from the music, what do you get up to?

Most things we probably shouldn’t discuss - haha!

But when we are not in the studio we are just getting on with life and dealing with everyday situations. Or catch us medicating with the boys playing on FIFA.

Tell us something about yourselves which readers won’t know.

Jeopardy’s single Scouse Ebonics has been played by Charlie Sloth on BBC Radio 1 and 1Xtra

And Big O writes choruses in his sleep.

So, what’s next - and where can we find your music?

Our latest album called ‘Great Minds Think Alike’ is available right now on iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Spotify and the CD version is on sale at RAN on Bold Street, Liverpool.